Threads That Live Again

[kevin_standlee]

One of the things I dislike about LiveJournal is how quickly threads die. I'd love to have a (user definable yes/no) feature that said, "If I ever post a comment on an LJ entry, notify me if another comment is posted to it." Yes, we have the "watch" command, but you have to activate it for every LJ entry. I would like to be able to assume that if I comment something, I'm interested in reading what others have read even if it isn't a direct response to my comment.

Anyway, a thread about Denvention Three's hotel situation has received fresh comments that may interest some of you.

Comments

[thirdworld.livejournal.com]

LJ lets you tag any conversation you like and be notified by email when someone replies, no matter how much later that is.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

Yes, I know that. But you have to explicitly declare it on any given thread. There's no way to make a default of "ping me if I reply to the thread."

[thirdworld.livejournal.com]

That would be good in this case, but I'd hate it. I reply to a lot of people's threads, just to chip in and let them know I'm thinking of them, but I don't want to be emailed every time someone replied to them.

Other BBs/communities I know use these approaches:
A sort sequence by date. Posts with the most recent replies sort to the top.
The ability to see all posts where you made a comment, ever.

I think we could think up more too. LJ is working on a new search facility and maybe something like this is included.

[buddykat.livejournal.com]

I agree with thirdworld, I don't necessarily want it on every single comment I ever make, but it would be nice if there were a check box to track the post when you leave a comment.

[yourbob.livejournal.com]

No, Livejournal is not going to rewrite its software to suit your personal preferences just because you bought a ticket.

(grins and giggles and runs away)

Threads That Live Again

[tkunsman.livejournal.com]

I would love to see a sort sequence by date feature on LJ. This would make any threads that come back to life, be more noticable.

Dawn of the Living Thread

[howeird]

If it can be done on a per-thread basis, I don't see why it can't be done globally. It would not be a huge programming challenge because the core code is already built.

OTOH, I really don't want to see every comment to every thread I've ever replied to. I've already stopped reading half of my friends' list because there are only so many hours in a century.

Re: Dawn of the Living Thread

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

OTOH, I really don't want to see every comment to every thread I've ever replied to.

That's why, if I were designing it, I'd make it one of your global options: "Automatically track any entry to which I reply? (Yes/No)" And I'd allow selective opting out; after all, you can opt-in to a specific entry now, so you should also be able to opt out of it.